Tempus Neminem Manet
by ThinkButThis
Summary: Post - WoM assuming Adelaide didn't kill herself. The Doctor's breakdown has more effect on the Universe than anyone could have thought. It will take the people who know him best to save him from himself.
1. Prequel: Post Tenebras Lux

Tempus Neminem Manet (Times Waits For No One)

(Author's Note: I do not own Doctor Who or any of it's spinoffs, that all belongs to the BBC. The following story is set where Doctor Who, and all spinoffs, currently lie. Post Children of Earth, Wedding of Sarah Jane Smith and Waters of Maters, to be exact. This story also assumes that Adelaide didn't go and kill herself in WoM for the rest of the story's sake. That said, Enjoy.)

Prequel: Post Tenebras Lux (Out of the darkness, Light)

"Did you feel that?" The female voice in the darkness that was more than darkness asked another being.

"Feel what?" A second voice, Welsh and male, responded.

"That... ripple, a ripple in time," There was a pause as the first speaker mulled over the situation. "It was faint, it didn't happen in this dimension... it was back on Earth, I think, in the near time and place you came from. Something has changed. Something big has changed. Something that wasn't supposed to have changed."

"Like..." The Welshman started before he was cut off by the other.

"Like a fixed point in time and space. Someone has altered it or tried too. It would have had to have been incredibly important and big for us to feel it all the way over here, all the way in Limbo."

"But who can change something like that? Something that is "fixed"?"

"Well, no one. No human, rather. They can't see time, they can't feel it. Even if they change their minds at the last minute, time already knew what decision they were going to make. Everything from the beginning to the end is predetermined."

There was silence. Silence and that strange sort of darkness that was dark and light all at once.

"Then who was it? What was it?"

"I don't know but I do know that I think that was our calling card. Time to go home and see if all our hard work has paid off."

"But we haven't finished our game," There was playful sadness in the male voice.

The sound of a hand of cards hitting a table was heard. "Not much of a game anymore, hmm? Royal Flush."

"Ah, you cheat! You always cheat."

"Nah, I'm just good with strategy games. Now come on, we've got work to do."

"Yes, ma'am."

With that, there was only silence again. The dark that wasn't dark and the silence.


	2. Chapter 1: Vincere Est Totum

Chapter 1: Vincere Est Totum (To Win is Everything)

He was the Time Lord Victorious – the winner of all winners, the sole survivor of the greatest war that the universe had ever seen.

Damn himself, if he had only realized this sooner! All the people he could have saved, all the events he could have prevented.

And when he finally did go and change something (and what a big and glorious and necessary event he had tried to prevent) he had failed. The base had still exploded, Abigail had gone and shot herself – did the two lives that he had saved really mattered? Would anything be any different if they were dead?

He shook his head, no – he knew the answer to that question. No, they would not be. They were little people, insignificant people. Their lives did not matter in the bigger picture.

Adelaide's words rang in his head. _No one should have that much power._

His response, which he now repeated out loud even though there was no one around to hear him, had been "Tough."

And when she had asked if there was anything that could stop him he had said 'Not anymore.'

He really was the only one left – the laws governing time belonged to him. It was now his responsibility to be the caretaker of time itself and that put him in the position to do with them what he wanted.

There was a little voice in the back of his head telling him that he was wrong, that just because he was the only one left didn't make him the winner and didn't let him make up the rules as he went. Years ago, the Time Lords had placed these rules upon themselves for a reason. Unfortunately, he had pushed that voice into the far reaches of his mind so that he could only hear a faint whisper of argument and that was easy to ignore.

He was becoming someone he had never imagined himself becoming – he was a monster.

He slammed the palm of his hand into the metal that was the TARDIS control panel and heard her whir her worry. "No! Not now," he muttered through gritted teeth. "Damn it, not now!"

He punched in a location on the monitor and felt his ship hesitate. "Go, already!" He had never been nasty to her. He had never been nasty to anyone who didn't deserve it. Then again, he had never changed a fix point in time, either.

He didn't care anymore, he had lost absolutely everything...everyone.

And the Doctor was not going to lose now.

The vworp vworp filled the night as the TARDIS disappeared, leaving only a faint square shape in the snow on the street where it had once been sitting. In the morning, there would be no trace of his presence.

* * *

"It's a crude device," The female voice started, the sound of buttons clicking underneath her statement, "but we had to make do with what we had and in limbo, that's next to nothing."

"Well, I'm not sure people were meant to leave."

"And people in our situation weren't meant to end up here anyway." A strange sound, almost like a buzzing/whistling/mechanical noise was heard and a faint orange light illuminated the near darkness. The device was small yet bulky, being very much a box and appearing to be made out of the shell of an older handheld game system and a camera with some bits of mobile phone and other random trinkets attached in weird ways. "We just had to MacGuyver our way out of here...or try to. I've been here a hundred and three years and you've yet to see me escape."

"You said you didn't have the right pieces."

"Nope! I'm hoping your mobile makes the difference. I don't carry one, I never really had a need. Who was I going to call?"

There was a notable pause, both parties aware that she had set herself up.

"The ghostbusters?" The Welsh voice asked bemusedly.

The woman laughed. "While I bet they're top notch when it comes to the paranormal, which, by the way, isn't even paranormal in most cases, it's alien, I doubt they could rescue us from an outer dimension." More of the strange half-buzzing noise and the sound of someone messing with the Frakensteined device.

"Then who would you call?"

Making light of a difficult situation, that's what this was called.

"To save us from an outer dimension?" There was a pause as the female considered the question. "Superman probably has the ability but he's a pansy, Batman never really leaves his cave, I don't think any of the comic book heroes would really do us any good. I think I'd take the American General Robert E. Lee, born three hundred years later and pilot of one of the Superships that are so popular at the time. I think he'd be able to rescue us, if he had a little help."

There was silence. What would you even say in response to that?

The man didn't need to come up with an answer, because the strange noise stopped and the woman jumped up. "There! Done, the best we're going to get it, let's just hope this works. You can swim, can't ya? I have absolutely no idea or control of where this is going to land us. If we come around covered in plaster, well...scream and hopefully someone will hear us." She counted on her fingers, muttering under her breath and ticking off worst case scenarios - "Lava? Well, you'll be toast before you're even conscious. Considering that most of the planet is water, we'll have a more likely chance of landing there. Just remember, if the sharks get ya, punch them in the eye." She winked, whether he could see it or not she didn't know.

"And what if we don't come out whole on the other side? I'm not unfamiliar with all this...alien...stuff." He really couldn't find a better word.

"Well," He was right. What then? "We'll cross that bridge when we come to it!"

She grabbed his arm and looped it around hers in the dark, turning the device around to face them and extending her arm, like she was a high school student trying to take a picture of her and her best friend for her facebook profile picture. "Smile!" She added for dramatic effect, clicking the button before her companion had a chance to respond. The area was illuminated dramatically, followed by a wave of energy that hit them like a Tsunami.

And then they were gone and limbo, once more, was empty.


	3. Chapter 2: Terra Firma

Chapter 2: Terra Firma (Solid Ground)

They came back to Earth in a crashing way, feeling like they had been shot out of a canon or something significant. There they lay, face first in the concrete, people passing them by and shooting confused looks, probably mentally bemoaning the fact about the drunks ruining the view.

"Oh..." The woman muttered. She was young, appearing to be in her mid twenties. Her curly red hair hung a few inches below her shoulders and her green eyes managed to show both age and pain (the latter likely from the landing.) She wasn't short, she wasn't tall and if it hadn't been for her clothes, she'd look just average. Her style of dress was old-fashioned and out of date by a couple of hundred years. She had fitted tan breeches that could have passed for modern day riding pants, coupled with that was a high collared red shirt, a black vest and a long, knee length black wool coat. Her boots started where her coat left off. She looked like she belonged on one of the British naval ships of old.

A glance to her right revealed a body of water. "At least we didn't land in the water." No, in fact they had missed it by just a couple feet. "Are you alive over there?" She asked as she pushed herself up and stretched out her aching bones.

Her partner wasn't a stranger to their present location, thought he had yet to realize it himself. He was pale, with short, neat brown hair and brown eyes. Anyone passing by could have seen he was handsome. His natural good looks were made even better by the smart suit he was wearing.

This could have been any other day for Ianto Jones.

"Barely, but I think I'm alright. You could have warned me of the blast." He muttered, making sure he was still in one piece.

"I would have, had I know. Where are we?" She looked around and, not having her answer, reached into her pocket to find something to help.

No need, Ianto had the answer. "Cardiff," He stated unbelieving. "We're in Cardiff."

He looked around with wide eyes, like he was seeing the city for the first time. He was home.

"Really? Wow. Been a while since I last saw it, I really should get out more." She fiddled with her pockets, pulling out odds and ends that appeared to have no purpose in everyday life like super balls, a small, handheld telescope and the deck of cards that been the source of their poker game earlier. "Now where did I put that thing?" She'd have to check another pocket. This one was full of items but not the one she was looking for. "So soon as I find this blasted thing, we can get a move on."

No response for a moment and she turned to see Ianto in full out run, heading...well, she had no idea but he was heading away from her, that's all she knew.

"Ianto!" She called, taking off at a brisk jog to try and catch up. She wasn't going to be left behind.

* * *

He sat at the beginning of creation – Earth's specifically. One thing that hadn't changed was his fascination with the planet. The last time he had been here had been was with Donna Noble.

Donna.

He had liked her, not like he had liked Rose. Donna had been a friend and that's all he had wanted. She had always been there with a witty joke, a saucy attitude and to stop him when he had gotten carried away. She had done it time and time again – with the Racnos, the people of Pompeii. How many had Donna Noble saved?

But then he'd lost her like he'd lost Martha and Rose and Jack and Sarah Jane and all the other people who had traveled with him over the years.

Just like he'd lost his own people.

But not anymore, he wouldn't lose anyone anymore. People would die, people had to die but he was going to save the ones who mattered, even if the future called for their deaths. He and he alone was lord and master of time now. It would be his playground.

He closed the TARDIS door and returned to the control panel. Where to start first? What was the most pressing issue that needed to be fixed?


	4. Chapter 3: De Mortuis Nil Nisi Bonum

Chapter 3: De Mortuis Nil Nisi Bonum (Say Nothing But Good About The Dead)

"Ianto," the woman panted, catching up to him when he finally stopped. "What are you doing? You just left me there, thanks for that."

"It's gone," He muttered, barely audible. "It's all...gone." Standing here, looking at this place, the events from those days came rushing back to him, like someone had opened the flood gates at a dam. How long ago had it been since that had happened? No time ever passed in Limbo so it was difficult to say.

"What's gone?" The red head asked, answering her own question only moments later as she realized who she was talking to. "Oh... right, the Hub. Torchwood Three – Cardiff. The Renegade." She remembered, even to her, trapped where she had been all those years, the place was not unheard of.

"It was," he paused, breaking his sentence with a deep gulp, "destroyed when the 456 came. I don't think they've rebuilt... if they did, I wouldn't be able to get in. They wouldn't have programmed me back... I'm dead."

"Not now, but you were." The woman's voice had softened. There was no longer that harsh edge he had often heard in Limbo. "It's good to be alive, isn't it?"

"Yeah," Ianto really didn't have much more to say than that. He was still in shock – the 456, the destruction of the Hub, losing Jack...dying and coming back to life. It was too much.

"Do you have someone you can call? Anyone? We need to sit down and figure things out. This event that was changed... we need to figure out the what, why, how, when and who."

Ianto was silent. Did he have anyone he could call? Who else had died when he did? Jack? Gwen? Rhys? Who was left?

"Ianto?" He had been silent longer than he had thought.

"Right. Um... I suppose I could give it a shot. But you've, well, destroyed my mobile..."

"Oh, yes... I did do that. Guilty as charged." There was half a second of silence before the woman spoke again, this time bounding off as she spotted something across the way. "No worries though! We'll use the payphone."

"I didn't die with spare change in my pockets," Sometimes he couldn't help but wonder on what level the girl's sanity was at.

"We won't need change," She muttered, throwing a glance over her shoulder before she took out the machine that had made the strange noises earlier. She pointed the orange light at the phone, let it buzz, whistle and whir for a few seconds before handing the phone off to him. "There ya go! No money needed."

It was now that Ianto realized that the device that she held was a sonic screwdriver. Torchwood had a whole file on the Doctor's – he had only read it once but he was well aware of it's capabilities. Why hadn't he realized it before? He should have known what it was even before he was actually able to see it.

"...Thanks." He took the phone and glanced cautiously at her before she nudged him on with her eyes. He nodded and dialed the first number that sprang to mind. It was one that he knew by heart.

"We're sorry...this number has been disconnected..." He listened to the operator relay her message. The number was...inactive. It was Jack's number and it was gone. Did that mean his partner was gone as well?

"Sorry... I'll," he paused, trying not to get choked up. He needed to get over himself, clear his head... he knew he was being too emotional but it was all just too shocking. "I'll try another number." Gwen's, of course, that was, if he could remember it.

The first try landed him a wrong number, as did the second (this one had been angry at him for waking her up, apparently she worked the night shift) but the third finally got through. "Hello?" The voice on the other end of the phone asked. It was her.

"Gwen?" Ianto asked, his voice disbelieving and barely a whisper.

There was silence for nearly a minute. Apparently she couldn't believe her ears, so to speak. "...Ianto? Is that you? But you... you died."

"I did... sort of. I can explain more to you in person or...she can. She understands better than I do. Are you still around? Can we meet you somewhere?"

In the rushed conversation that followed, Gwen offered to meet them at their current location. She'd be there in about half an hour. Ianto hung up the phone, so many thoughts streaming through his head that he didn't know what to think. Now it was just a waiting game. He sat down on the step next to the red-headed woman and looked out across the bay. He said nothing, only stared at the water.

A few minutes later, she nudged him. "Poker?" She asked, holding out the deck of cards with raised eyebrows and a devious expression.

He chucked, he couldn't help it even with all the sadness he had right now. "No, you always win. I still think you cheat."

"Ha, you wish. You're just abnormally horrible at poker."

"Or you cheat."

Her eyes twinkled, "That sounds like a challenge to me."

They had half an hour to kill and he really wanted to take his mind off Jack and the 456 until he found out what really happened. Maybe one game couldn't hurt.


	5. Chapter 4: A Posse Ad Esse

Chapter 4: A Posse Ad Esse (From Possibility to Actuality)

Everyone expected a tearful reunion. When Gwen Cooper stepped out of her car, her hands flew up to cover her face. She couldn't believe she was actually seeing him. She had watched his funeral... she'd watched him be put into the ground and now here he was, apparently as alive as ever.

He wanted to go to her but something held him back. Would she completely accept him now that he had seemingly been resurrected? And how long has it been? 1 week, 10 years? He blinked that thought from his head, no...she didn't look that different. It couldn't have been 10 years.

"Ianto," she whispered, running to him and pulling him into a hug, tears streaming down her face. It was really him in the flesh and blood and bone. She had been alone for far too long.

He didn't know what to say. He just stood there and held her as she sobbed, unable to stop himself from tearing up as well. They just stood there in silence for a few minutes before either dared to speak.

"How?" Gwen asked, knowing very well that being brought back to life wasn't always a good thing. There had been that issue with the resurrection gauntlet... the risen mitten as he had called it.

How did he explain? He couldn't...even now, he really had no idea what had happened to them or how he had even landed in limbo in the first place. "Ask her..." He turned around and pointed to his companion, only to find she had wandered off about twenty feet and was entertaining a few small children by juggling five of the bouncy balls that had been in her pocket.

"Who is she?"

"She's..." Who exactly was she? She'd never given him her name. "A Captain, that's all she told me but she's the one who brought us back. She knows a lot more about what's going on then I do."

Gwen gave him one more hug before grabbing his hand and leading him to the young woman. She still couldn't believe that he was alive...flesh and blood and here she was touching him. If Jack knew...

Jack. How was she going to get news to Jack? She hadn't seen or heard from him since he had taken off after the 456.

Ianto tapped the redhead on the shoulder, surprising her and making her miss a beat in her juggling routine. The super balls scattered and the children went running after them, squealing in delight. "Oh well," She said with a shrug, "More where those came from."

Years ago, a friend of hers had used a yo-yo to check the gravity of an alien planet. She had thought it was a genius idea and had adapted a similar trick to fit her needs – thus, the super balls.

"Captain, this is..." Ianto started before the woman cut him off.

"Gwen Cooper, a pleasure to finally meet you properly." A cryptic introduction, Gwen noted, one that would have to be addressed later. Right now, she was more concerned about her former partner.

"Excuse me for being rude but...Ianto was dead. I was at his funeral. How is he back? What tricks are you playing?"

"No tricks! I was dead too, well...sort of. It's a long story but he really is back now. That's all that matters, isn't it?" A look from Gwen told her that she better exaggerate.

She sighed and took a seat on the step and stared out at the bay. "Limbo is the place that people go if they die before they were supposed to. Time doesn't know what to do when this happens and it jumps around trying to find a way to work them back into their time line. Usually they're only there for a few minutes, maybe a day at the most, before 'some miracle happens' and they're brought back to life. All those stories about the light at the end of the tunnel... that's Limbo. It's not so much a light as darkness that pretends to be light but trust me, they're one and the same."

She paused to compose her thoughts and Ianto and Gwen joined her on the steps. This was the first time that the man had heard most of the story. He'd only managed to get bits and pieces from her while they were stuck. It was new to him too.

"So Ianto really was dead but he wasn't supposed to die. He had a long life ahead of him. Same with me. But what makes us different is that time actually couldn't find a way to work us back into our time lines so we were both dead and alive – the Schroedinger's cat of the universe, so to speak. Dead without actually being dead but alive without actually being alive. We just...were."

"And how did you get out?" Gwen asked, her voice lighter than it had been moments before.

The other woman looked at her with a grin. "Easy! We made a dimensional wave generator. Oh, it wasn't easy and man did it take ages to finally be able to get all the right pieces but we did it and we're here."

"What's a dimensional wave generator?" This time it was Ianto asking the question. "You never did say."

"Oh, it's easy and just what it says. It creates a force to... bump us from one dimension to the next, in this case from Limbo to Earth. However, I didn't think it was an actual wave, per say, so I do apologize for that, Ianto."

There was nothing but the sound of the city and the sound of the bay.

"Who are you?" Gwen asked again. Alien, no doubt. She looked human but so did other aliens. The way she talked though...that couldn't be human.

"Captain. Call me Captain."

"That's not a name. It's a title."

"Ah, but what's in a name? Captain is what I'm called." The woman hated people prying into her life like this. There was only so much information she could give them without giving them more than she wanted to.

"You're not human."

"Is that a problem?"

Gwen shook her head. They'd dealt with aliens before and there were good and bad aliens just like there was good and bad people.

"Good."

Still though, it was hard to trust someone you had virtually no information about.. She wasn't giving them anything. "Can you at least tell us where you're from? Something?" Hopefully it was a planet she had heard of.

The strange woman got up and turned towards them, her back to the sun, casting her image in shadow. "Me? I'm from Gallifrey."


	6. Author's Note: A Few Questions

Dear Loyal Readers -

A few questions to those of you who have followed and thoroughly enjoyed Tempus Naminem Manet to assist me as I attempt to figure out in which direction I would like to take the story. I hope to have the next chapter up after finals end this week, by the way. If you could drop a comment here and answer these questions, it would be greatly appreciated.

Who do you think the Captain is? Who would you like to see her be? You can tell me about her personality, her history, her relationship with the Doctor. I've got a few different versions of this character and I'd like your help deciding which to use.

What do you want to see happen with the Doctor? Should be break down and lose it more? Start to get better?

Anything not mentioned that you'd like to see happen with the story? I'm here to give you all a good read and if I can take an idea that you'd enjoy and incorporate it, I'll do it.

Thanks for taking the time to answer! I'm glad you all like the story so far and I hope I can keep up the good work. Again, look for the next chapter in about a week!

Cheers,

Lumi


	7. Chapter 5: Exuent Omnes

Chapter 5: Exuent Omnes (All Go Out)

Pompeii. That's where he would start. It wasn't the most important event in time (at least to him anyway) but it would be a good warm-up. He remembered how Donna had reacted when she had found out that they couldn't save all those people from the volcano. He would do this for her.

"No one to stop me now, Donna. Look at that – I'm doing just what you wanted for a change." He muttered as the TARDIS landed and all the noise inside just stopped. He paused in the doorway briefly before throwing open the doors. Thrusting his hands in his pockets, he stepped out into the cool, morning air.

"Nothing like a volcano eruption to set your mind straight." Again, he was talking to himself but who was there to talk to now? He was all alone...again.

"Now then," He checked his watch, "Eight hours and counting. How to mobilize an entire city in eight hours?"

He walked through the Roman streets looking around. Surely he could find a cultural clue. And what did he learn last time he was here that could help him now?

Being a Time Lord, he had an impeccable memory. Most other species would have forgotten a lot of the little details of the event – it was just one more thing that made him better than all the rest.

"Of course!" He yelled, as his own maniacal thinking had led him to an answer. Superstition – all the people here had been, no, were highly superstitious. Maybe if he could work a little so-called magic with his brilliant mind and his futuristic technology then they would follow him right off this island and to safety. He'd save Pompeii...and he'd do it for Donna Noble.

And no one was here to stop him.

Of course, he had to be careful not to cross his own path and he had to counteract everything the other him was doing but he was sure that he could even outthink himself if he really tried.

He was, after all, the ultimate winner.

* * *

Where had Gwen heard of that before? "Where is that?" She was fishing, she knew that, bu tshe had yet to find out if she trusted this girl.

"The Medusa Cascade – does it really matter? Ianto and I came back because we have a job to do so I thin there are more pressing issues than my personal profile, if you don't mind. Someone has been changing time – and that can't happen...it's very, very bad news when it does."

"But how can you tell You never told me – just that it happened." Ianto, unlike Gwen, already trusted the Captain, after all, she had given him no reason not to while they were trapped in Limbo. Not to mention, she had helped him escape and, even if it had been unintentional, had helped him return to Cardiff and had reunited him with at least a portion of his team.

"I can," she paused wondering how she was going to explain this to the humans. "I can see time – the past, the present...the future, too. Well, so to speak. And some points in time are fixed – they are so important in the vast scheme of things, so important to the universe and have such an impact on the whole of time that they can't be changed. But you see, that's the problem because someone or something has changed one and I could feel the ripple and the effect of that all the way in Limbo, in another dimension. And that's not good."

They sat in silence, watching the waves on the bay and listening to the wind blow by. Gwen and Ianto had been around alien situations enough to know that this sort of bad news meant really bad news.

"So then...what now?" Gwen had let her distrust of the young woman go for the time being. If what she was saying was true, and there had been no proof otherwise, than there were much more pressing issues at hand.

"We need to find my ship...and your Captain Jack Harkness. Am I correct in assuming that he took off after the thing with the 456?" Gwen just looked at Ianto and nodded sadly. It wasn't her fault but it didn't stop her from feeling guilty, especially since she had to break the news.

"He couldn't take it – Ianto's death...and his grandson's. He blamed himself for the whole thing."

"Typical human reaction – that egocentric view. 'It's all about me, it's all my fault. Blah blah blah.' Don't worry, mate. He'll snap out of it when he sees you." This was to Ianto.

"Now!" The redhead started again, not giving either of them enough time to comment on her human bashing. "My ship. I'm going to need your help."

"Is it even here on Earth? You did spend the last...how many years in Limbo?" Gwen asked, wondering why her ship would be here without her.

"One hundred and three but yes, as a matter of fact, my ship is here. If it had been any other planet, we'd be out of luck but aaah, good old Earth! My TARDIS defaults here if I set the distress signal – it's both a safety precaution and it helps me remember where I left it."

Both Gwen and Ianto hadn't heard the end of her sentence – one word stood out to them. Now Gwen Cooper knew where she had heard the word Gallifrey before.

"You're a Time Lord." Ianto stammered, beating Gwen to the punch.

The Captain's surprise at them knowing her species faded after a moment. "So you've heard..."

Gwen cut her off. "But the Doctor, he's supposed to be the only one left." Yes, Torchwood's file on Jack's mysterious friend had mentioned that quite a few times. Apparently one other Time Lord had popped up but had died shortly after, refusing to regenerate after his wife shot him. So the Doctor was left alone, again.

Or so they thought.

The Captain froze. She knew the Doctor. Oh, she knew him very well, in fact. Could he be responsible for something like this – changing fixed points in time? They had gone to school together and she had only seen him a few times since then but the Doctor she knew would never do something like this. If this had happened while back at the Academy, it probably would have been pegged on her rather than him. Yes, he did cause trouble but never like the sort she caused. She had always been beating heads with her teachers, he had just challenged them intellectually.

Still though, people change. Humans and Time Lords alike. She was almost positive that'd he'd regenerated since the last time she had seen him... maybe this new regeneration was the sort to not follow the rules.

"No one ever looks in Limbo." She muttered under her breath as she continued to dig around in her pockets looking for something.

"I should have known when I saw the sonic screwdriver...or when you started rambling about time in Limbo." At this point, Ianto was feeling a bit betrayed and a little bit angry at himself for not knowing sooner. This sudden realization explained a whole lot.

"It's not like I go around flaunting it. I'm an endangered species from what I understand. If I'm not careful, I could be hunted halfway across the galaxy and mounted on some rich bloke's wall. Don't be too hard on yourself." She didn't look him in the eye – it wasn't out of shame, no. She just didn't want him to see the fire that burned in her eyes. They'd have to act a lot quicker than she had anticipated if there was a Time Lord behind this...and she had an ever growing suspicion that there was.

"Aha!" At the discovery of the book she had been searching for, her demeanor changed. Suddenly, she the playful and energetic girl that Ianto had known in Limbo was back. "Here it is, I knew it was in there somewhere."

"20,000 Leagues Under the Sea? That's your reminder? What goods a science fiction story from the 1800s going to do?" This was Gwen, starting to get a bit tired of the other woman's games and wishing that she'd just come out with it already.

The Captain didn't get frustrated or angry at the snappish tone – she just grinned. "I'll show you." She proceeded to flip through the book until she came to a dog-eared page near the end. Her eyes scanned the page quickly before she turned both the book and her attention towards her companions. "Fancy a trip to Norway?" She asked as her finger fell across a mention of Moskstraumen, also known as the Maelstrom.

"Let me get this straight..." Gwen tried to keep her voice level but her frustration was ever apparent. She crossed her arms so she wouldn't start waving them about like a mad woman. "You hid your ship... in a whirlpool? That doesn't even seem like a good idea!"

"Well," Ianto cut in before the Captain could respond. "It does make some sense if you think about it. Who is going to look there? It would be like hiding something in the Bermuda Triangle."

"You do not even want to know what's hidden down there that's causing all those problems. Trust me, I was there when it happened... oh, it's not pretty." The Captain had completely missed the point but Ianto was used to this. It only seemed like she hadn't gotten it but he knew she was too smart for anything to go over her head like that. A lot of times it seemed she played down her intelligence. Why, he couldn't guess.

"Exactly. I don't want anyone sticking their nose in my business. If I'm not going to be on my ship, I don't want to come back and find it hanging in a museum with tourists taking pictures of it and buying little plastic models. If that fell into the wrong hands... there are about 74 very, very bad things someone clever could do with it that would cause a lot, lot of problems for everyone."

Gwen took a deep breath and rubbed her temples. She felt like she was babysitting. "So if your ship is in the maelstrom does that mean we'll need a boat?"

"And someone to sail it."

"And quickly, if my feelings on the situation are correct...we're running out of time."


End file.
